Martin Salter was Labour MP for Reading West from 1997 until 2010, when he retired from Parliament. He is Vice Chair (Environment) of the Labour Party and a keen angler.

Lobbygate was an accident waiting to happen for greedy part-time MPs

The dark joke doing the rounds at Westminster is that the ex-Ministers lobbygate sting so successfully carried out by the Sunday Times and Channel Four’s Dispatches programme has given new meaning to the term, “available only to the highest Byers.” But there’s nothing funny about either the pathetic boasting of the now whipless and soon to be former MP nor the totally useless regime of self-regulation that is supposed to control the activities of UK lobbyists.

David Cameron is absolutely right to claim that lobbying is the next big scandal waiting to happen. And it is just as likely to explode within the ranks of his own MPs, but for real rather than the false and exaggerated claims made to an undercover reporter by the hapless Byers as he preened himself in readiness for a well remunerated life outside Westminster. I would like to think that no self respecting company would even dream of hiring the services of a tainted MP but take a look at the plum jobs landed by Cameron’s own former Chief of Staff, Andrew Mackay. The Bracknell Tory MP, who was forced to stand down over his dubious shared second home expenses claims, has landed a lucrative little number with lobbyists Burston-Marsteller who are clearly not shy of employing one of the most high profile casualties of the MP expenses scandal. I also see that no less than 28 Tory Parliamentary candidates in potentially winnable seats currently work for lobbyists and that high profile lobbyists like George Bridges and Bill Clare are now working at the heart of Cameron’s election campaign.

For those of us who have campaigned long and hard against the inevitable conflict of interests that arise from allowing MPs to sit on company boards; have second, third or even fourth jobs or work for private sector lobbyists, these revelations are a grim reminder of how much further there is to go to properly cleanse our political system. In researching for my Private Member’s Bill in 2007 which would have outlawed moonlighting by MPs with the exception of writing or broadcasting – I discovered that there was a direct correlation between the highest outside earners and those with the poorest attendance records in the Commons. I suppose even the greediest of my colleagues would struggle to sit in the boardroom and the green benches of the Commons at the same time. And of course lobbying and special interest pleading in all its guises is the prime reason why companies and corporate interests are prepared to hire serving MPs.

My research, not unsurprisingly, showed that Conservative MPs were at the front of the queue to supplement their obviously “inadequate” £65,000 salaries, with 51 percent of Tory MPs registering outside interests compared to 24 percent of Lib Dems and 9 percent from Labour.

So what still needs to be done? Well all the parties’ leaders could do worse than dust down the recommendations of the Commons Public Administration Select Committee which, in January last year, called for a statutory register of lobbyists to be established. Cameron and his cronies were distinctly lukewarm on this at the time and it has taken this scandal to push Harriet Harman to announce tougher curbs on lobbying in line with the Committee’s recommendations. Secondly, the ineffective Advisory Committee on Business Appointments governing the conduct of ex-Ministers should cease being advisory and should be given both regulatory powers and meaningful sanctions. Thirdly, sitting MPs should no longer be able to offer themselves for hire. Membership of the House of Commons is a full time job and pays a perfectly reasonable full-time salary.